Khari Willis (27) Brian Lewerke (14), Joe Bachie (35), David Dowell (6) and Michigan State basketball coach Tom Izzo walk out to mid field for the coin toss before the Spartans' game Saturday night at Arizona State in Tempe, Arizona.(Photo: Christian Petersen/Getty Images)

The 24th-ranked Spartans, after their bye this weekend, will play their third straight night game, at 7:30 p.m.Sept. 22, when they travel to Indiana to open Big Ten play (Big Ten Network).

It will mark MSU’s 18th kickoff under the lights in the past five regular seasons and the Spartans’ 23rd beginning after the 3:30 p.m. Eastern window of games, when including postseason games and an afternoon kickoff at Oregon in 2014.

MSU has never played three straight night games in program history, and the Spartans also have never played consecutive regular-season road games at night.

“Having a night game as opposed to a day game, we're just going to play them when we’re supposed to play them and get excited about an opportunity to do that,” MSU coach Mark Dantonio said Tuesday. “Third straight night game. Two of our scrimmages in the summer were at night knowing we would experience this, so we'll prepare ourselves accordingly.”

The Spartans are 11-6 in regular-season night games since 2014. Dantonio is 17-10 in his 12 years in night games during the regular season and 23-13 overall at night including bowl games, Big Ten championship games and West Coast kickoffs that alter his team’s internal clocks.

Dantonio said he prepared his team for not only the hot weather but by keeping players up late throughout the week for a game that did not end until 2:18 a.m. Sunday in Michigan. The Spartans gave up 13 points and 123 yards in the final quarter while going scoreless and committing five penalties in those final 15 minutes.

“I don’t think that any of that was really an issue,” wide receiver Cody White said early Sunday morning. “We came ready to play. Nothing really affected us in that area. I feel like we just didn’t finish in that fourth quarter.”

From 2007-12, MSU played 12 night games, including a 5 p.m. Pacific start at California in 2008, the 2009 Alamo Bowl and the 2012 Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl.

That number has doubled since 2013, in part due to the Big Ten’s requirement that programs install permanent lights to meet the Big Ten Network’s demand for night games. College athletic directors and presidents also have relinquished the decision on kickoff times to TV networks the past few years, which has added to the increase.

The Spartans went from playing one night game during Dantonio’s first season, a 2007 homecoming win over Indiana, to four during each of the 2015 and ’16 regular seasons — along with a win in the 2015 Big Ten title game over Iowa and a loss to Alabama in the College Football Playoff that year, which were both late kickoffs. They played three night games as well as the Holiday Bowl last year, going 3-1.

MSU first played consecutive night games at home against Iowa and at Minnesota in 2009. The Spartans did it twice in 2014 and 2015 (including postseason), and once each in 2016 and last season.

“Like I said, we'll line them up and play,” Dantonio said. “There's only certain things you can control, and most of it you cannot.”